without them what would little boys do
by Kelly123
Summary: Every family has disagreements around the dinner table. The Starks are no different. ONE-SHOT.


_You know how some little scene pops into your head, and it doesn't really make sense in the current context, but you feel the need to write it down and try to hash it out the best you can just because you want to see it play out?_

_No? Just me? Ehh, figures._

_Regardless, that is what happened here. It is AU, and let's just leave it at that. I saw a tidbit in the middle flash though my mind one day, and it didn't really make sense as far as who was there and why, but I wanted to see it come to fruition, so oh well.  
_

_(I feel like any fluff in this series is going to be AU, because...well, there is a lot of blood.)  
_

_D: Not mine._

* * *

"But...but..._Father!"_

"That is more than enough, Sansa." Eddard Stark said with a sigh, exhaustion and a hint of irritation evident in his voice. From the corner of his gaze he caught sight of his son Robb rolling his eyes in Jon's direction at their sister's dramatics, the solemn young man allowing the corner of his mouth to peak upwards just the slightest in agreement. Ned turned away from his eldest sons, lest he give in to his desire to do the same.

He was not a man meant for daughters, surely.

He loved his children, as truly as a man could love anything, to be certain, but the old gods had played a cruel trick by gifting him with such a child as Sansa. The boys he could handle. He had taught them to be strong and honorable and brave, to wield a sword and dispense justice fairly, just as his Lord father had before him. His sons had grown into fine men, and Bran and Rickon were following closely to their brothers' footsteps. But the girls...how could anything be as dear to a man's heart and yet so completely foreign to his head as one's own daughters?

To make matters worse, they were as different as any two children of the same blood had right to be. The younger, his Arya, was her own kind of trouble entirely. At three and ten she was headstrong and brash and far too much like Ned's own willful sister in look and deed than was good for her. He often did not notice that she occupied the space between Jon and Robb in the yard until she was already covered in mud and bruises, though she would be damned if the same could not be said of her opponent. Frequently he found himself under the chastisement of his wife for treating her too much like a son and less like the lady she should have become by now. Truth be told, Arya was more often to be found in breeches than gowns, and he had to admit with the state of her needlework as it was, she did seem better suited for swords than needles. But Sansa...he could never confuse his eldest daughter's behavior as anything other than feminine.

Sweet, courteous, beautiful...and right now, a pain in his arse.

The family stood clustered haphazardly around the great hall following their meal. The food had been cleared away, but the littlest two of his children remained seated at the table next to their mother and Robb and Jon leaned against the wall, watching in amusement while Ned dealt with the girls. The front of Sansa's dress was blotched by a great purple stain, and Arya's wine glass lay empty on the ground. Both stood indignantly before their father, though from the way the younger cut her eyes at her sister, Ned doubted if the spill had been as accidental as she had claimed. None the less, he ordered both to their chambers for the ordeal, if for nothing more than to ease the sound of their arguing from his pounding head.

"But why are you punishing me, it's Arya that deserves it!"

"I am not punishing anyone, Sansa. You and your sister need to learn to control yourselves. You aren't children any longer."

"_I _know that, she's the one who needs to learn! It isn't fair! She isn't being...proper!"

"Why do I need to, when you've got enough courtesies shoved up your arse for the both of us?" Arya muttered under her breath, causing a muscle to twitch in Jon's jaw and earning her a snicker from Bran. Ned pretended he hadn't heard her crude words, though Catelyn scowled in confusion at their middle boy before the he gained control of himself again.

Sansa's lower lip began to tremble as the realization that she was losing this battle began to dawn on her. Her blue eyes grew wide as she glanced around the room, horrified by the bemused expressions on her brothers' faces and the smug look her sister was wearing. Ned felt a surge of pity for the girl, but she did not meet his gaze. Biting her lip, she threw her eyes desperately to her mother, pleading for understanding with the only other lady present. "You all treat her like she's one of the boys, but you don't even know! She _is_ a girl, and she isn't acting at all like a lady should! She poured her wine on me on purpose, and she's...she's...she's tumbling the smith's new apprentice!"

Ned felt his heart seize in his throat, and heard his wife let out a sharp gasp.

Arya? His feisty littlest daughter, who had no time for marriage or use for a husband...and the bastard boy?

Silence shocked the hall as the scandalous accusation settled over everyone, and Sansa clapped her hands over her mouth, as if in disbelief that the words which had been uttered had in fact come from her. Her bright blue eyes quickly filled with tears, and while everyone else's gaze surged to the girl whose honor was in question, she kept her own trained fearfully on the ground.

It would not have mattered if she had lifted her head to look upon her sister, for even then she would not have seen her coming.

Arya did not utter a word, but she was so quick and lithe on her feet that Ned regretted for half a moment letting her practice as she did with her sword. Launching herself like a predator at Sansa, she would have surely dug her claws into the cowering girl in an instant had not their father stepped between them. Snatching her up in his arms as though she were still Rickon's age, he held her tightly while she struggled violently against him, the strength and fury she displayed a surprise even to someone who knew her passionate nature as well as he did.

Far too passionate, if what Sansa said was true.

"Stupid-stupid girl!" she spit out, gray eyes as stormy as any gale and fixed dangerously on Sansa. "You-don't know-anything-about-him!"

"I'm sorry Arya!" came the tearful reply, "But I saw you, coming out of the forge yesterday, and you shouldn't be-"

"He's my best friend! Just because all your friends are so dreadfully _boring_ doesn't give you the right to try and take mine away!"

"Arya-" Ned spoke, his tongue feeling thick and clumsy in his mouth. It was much easier when he had found Robb and one of the kitchen maids in the stables, to laugh and cuff his hotly flushed son on the shoulder while he reprimanded him halfheartedly. But now...there was nothing in him that felt like laughing at this. "Arya, I think it best that you go speak with your mother in her chambers. At once."

The girl twisted in his arms, abandoning the glare she had fixed on her sister to turn and stare up at him with wide, scared eyes that reminded him so of the wobbly toddler he felt he had held in much the same way only yesterday.

"Father, Sansa's lying! Gendry wouldn't, I mean he didn't, we only, we just..." blushing brightly, she buried her face in the crook of his arm and he couldn't help but to clutch her more tightly to him.

"What happened with the smith, Arya?" Neither Ned nor his daughter had heard Catelyn approach, and though Sansa had run to her and stood clutching her mother for dear life, his wife's gaze was fixed solely on their younger girl.

He felt her tremble against his shoulder, and when she spoke, he moreso felt the rumble of her words into his sleeve than heard them. "Just...just a kiss."

The laughter he felt bubbling in the back of his throat in relief must have shown on his face, for the look Catelyn fixed him with was one of strict reprimand. He hid the smile playing at his lips by burying his face in her mussed brown hair, planting a kiss of his own at her temple. He felt her relax somewhat against him, and as she tipped her head back to look up shyly at him he was struck yet again at how much like Lyanna she looked, and just how beautiful she was becoming.

"And _where_ do you think you two are you going?" Catelyn asked, jolting her husband from his memories and bringing to his attention that now all which could be seen of Robb and Jon were their backs as they retreated from the room.

"Out." Robb muttered out between gritted teeth, sharing a look with his half-brother, their eyes matching for once in intensity, if not color. "We have business to attend to."

"Business?" Sansa, asked with a note of bewilderment in her still-quivering voice. "With whom?"

"The smith's apprentice." Jon answered her, turning his gaze to fix steadily through the window at the smoke which could be seen billowing from across the grounds. Ned recognized the look as one he had worn himself, remembering the protective feeling which had struck him the first time he had caught Robert leering at his sister. The apprentice would do well to mind himself around Robb and Jon.

"Don't you dare try and hurt him!" Arya screeched, her body tightly wound once more as she wrenched herself out of Ned's arms and went flying at her brothers, beating both of them with her fists with as much strength as she could muster. "Gendry is strong, stronger than you two, he'll-"

Each boy grabbed an arm and attempted to still her onslaught. "Control yourself sweetling." Robb spoke with a hint of mocking in his voice. "We only wish to speak with the boy, to explain how he must behave himself around our lady sister."

"I AM NOT A-"

"Yes she _is_ Mother! Tell her!" Sansa pleaded with Catelyn, ducking behind her mother when Arya turns to round on her yet again.

"Here she goes again..." Ned heard Bran mumble, a second before he caught sight of the boy disappearing out of the chaos through another window.

Catelyn raised her voice to speak of propriety, but the sound is lost in the din as Arya cannot decide to yell at her brothers or her sister and so decides to do both. Ned sighs heavily and finds himself sinking back into this chair, rubbing a hand across his weary brow.

"But Father?" came a small voice from his side, tugging at his sleeve, "I like Gendry?" said Rickon, surveying the scene before them with confusion and a bit of alarm.

"So does Arya, evidently." calls out his most serious son, and at the sound of Jon's voice Ned cannot hold back his laughter and guffaws loudly, gathering Rickon into his arms as his shoulders quake and thanking the gods for giving him more sons than daughters.

* * *

_The scene I couldn't get out of my head was Jon and Robb bowing up to lay the big brother act on Gendry. I fear I did not do it a quarter of the justice it deserves, but in my mind's eye it was just the cutest little thing!  
_


End file.
